Ken Livingstone, the former MP and Mayor of London, is no stranger to controversy. In his early years he was editor of the Labour Herald, a publication printed by the Workers’ Revolutionary Party, whose leader was Gerry Healy, a prominent antisemite.  He has stated on a number of occasions that it would be better off if Israel did not exist and in the process misquoted Lord Jakobovits, the former Chief Rabbi of Israel, to justify his position.  See here and here.

According to David Hirsh,

“Livingstone does more than ‘criticize the policies of the Israeli government’. For decades, he has been part of a movement in the UK which sees Israel as a pariah state with a menacing and malign influence well beyond its borders.”

During his tenure as mayor of London, he openly embraced Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a high profile member of the Muslim Brotherhood and avowed antisemite who in July 2003 spoke in favor of suicide terror attacks in the Stockholm Mosque at the 11th Convention of the European Council for Fatwa and Research.

He has also compared Israel’s then prime-minister to Slobodan Milsoevich and stated that the Likud party and Hamas are “two sides of the same coin”.

Livingstone is perhaps most notorious for his comparison of a Jewish journalist of the Evening Standard to a Nazi concentration camp guard at a press conference in 2005 outside City Hall. The full transcript of the exchange is below:

Oliver Finegold: Mr Livingstone, “Evening Standard.” How did tonight go?
Ken Livingstone: How awful for you. Have you thought of having treatment?
Finegold: How did tonight go?
Livingstone: Have you thought of having treatment?
Finegold: Was it a good party? What does it mean for you?
Livingstone: What did you do before? Were you a German war criminal?
Finegold: No, I’m Jewish, I wasn’t a German war criminal and I’m actually quite offended by that. So, how did tonight go?
Mr Livingstone: Arr right, well you might be, but actually you are just like a concentration camp guard, you are just doing it because you are paid to, aren’t you?
Finegold: Great, I have you on record for that. So, how was tonight?
Mr Livingstone: It’s nothing to do with you because your paper is a load of scumbags and reactionary bigots.
Finegold: I’m a journalist and I’m doing my job. I’m only asking for a comment.
Mr Livingstone: Well, work for a paper that doesn’t have a record of supporting fascism.

In the pages of the Guardian, Livingstone made the following statement in his attempt to clarify his statements on the Holocaust:

“Israel’s expansion has included ethnic cleansing. Palestinians who had lived in that land for centuries were driven out by systematic violence and terror aimed at ethnically cleansing what became a large part of the Israeli state. The methods of groups like the Irgun and the Stern gang were the same as those of the Bosnian Serb leader Karadzic: to drive out people by terror.” This is about Israel, not anti-semitism The Guardian March 4, 2005

On ‘Comment is Free’, Livingstone has stated:

“That requires an analysis that fits the facts. First, this is not a conflict between two equivalent forces. Hamas’s weapons are crude and inaccurate missiles capable of causing fear, naturally, but not of damage or death remotely approaching the scale of what Israel has inflicted upon Gaza. Second, the original ceasefire, which expired on December 19, was violated from the beginning by Israel. From the start, it failed to end its illegal blockade of Gaza within the 10 days envisaged. Instead, it was tightened, cutting off food, fuel, medicine and all movement of people, in and out. Alongside this, Israel continued military attacks, killing more than 20 people during what was supposed to be a ceasefire. Europe must take the initiative January 4, 2009